Cont: Proof of Immortality, V for Very long discussion

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Jabba said:
Agatha,
- Good answer. That's my point.
- It seems to me that there would be something significantly different between the two copies of me, but not between the two copies of Dave's wife's VWs.
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Nope. The two identical Jabbas would have the same memories, feelings, thoughts, etc. The 'copy' Jabba would know all of the intimate inner secrets and thoughts of 'original' Jabba. In fact, he would believe that he is the 'original' Jabba. And he wouldn't be wrong as there would be no way to distinguish between the two. His inner self is exactly the same as the other Jabba.

The above holds true at the instantaneous moment two separate Jabbas exist. From that moment, because they occupy slightly different dimensions in space, they would start to diverge from each other. They would then start to have different experiences. Each would remain Jabba but they wouldn't remain identical anymore. This is no different than when two identical VWs diverge as one is driven differently than the other. Bring them back together (either Jabbas or VWs) after a year and the pairs would no longer be identical.
 
JayUtah said:
You're obfuscating a very simple concept.

An event can't be more probable than the conditions it depends on, when considered broadly.

Your theory requires (1) a particular physical body, (2) a particular soul, (3) some mechanism to combine them.

Materialism requires (1) a particular physical body.

You're trying to argue that materialism is less probable than your theory. But your theory requires the same thing (1) as materialism, and then also additional things (2) and (3) that have their own probabilities. When those combine with (1), the result cannot possibly be more probable than (1) alone.
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Jay, (and jond)
- That makes some sense, but doesn't it strike you as simplistic?
 
Jabba said:
Agatha,
- Good answer. That's my point.
- It seems to me that there would be something significantly different between the two copies of me, but not between the two copies of Dave's wife's VWs.
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What would be different, and where/how does this difference arise?

Remember that the original you and the copy you are identical right down to the atomic level. Every neuron connection in the original you's brain is precisely replicated in the copy you's brain. Every thought and memory that you hold is equally held by the copy you.

Neither you nor the copy you would be able to tell each other apart - both would believe themselves to be the original, not the copy. Both Jabba1's sense of self and Jabba2's sense of self would be identical, though separate.

Why does it seem to you there would be a difference? Can you explain why you think there would be a difference, and/or what that difference is?
 
Jabba said:
- There are other issues to consider.
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No. Vague handwaving doesn't fix this problem. If
Your theory requires (1) a particular physical body, (2) a particular soul, (3) some mechanism to combine them.​
is an acceptable formulation of your theory, the law is provably correct for it.
 
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Agatha said:
What would be different, and where/how does this difference arise?

Remember that the original you and the copy you are identical right down to the atomic level. Every neuron connection in the original you's brain is precisely replicated in the copy you's brain. Every thought and memory that you hold is equally held by the copy you.

Neither you nor the copy you would be able to tell each other apart - both would believe themselves to be the original, not the copy. Both Jabba1's sense of self and Jabba2's sense of self would be identical, though separate.

Why does it seem to you there would be a difference? Can you explain why you think there would be a difference, and/or what that difference is?
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- I accept that creating a perfect copy of a living person would not have the first person looking through two sets of eyes, and creating a perfect copy of a dead person would not bring the first person back to life.
- Dinner time...
 
Jabba said:
- I accept that creating a perfect copy of a living person would not have the first person looking through two sets of eyes, and creating a perfect copy of a dead person would not bring the first person back to life.
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Good. Now do you accept that the perfect copy would have a perfect -- though distinct -- copy of the "self"?
 
Jabba said:
- There are other issues to consider.
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No, not within your stated goal. No matter how unlikely your existence may be, there is no question that the materialistic explanation is more likely than your explanation.
 
Jabba said:
- I accept that creating a perfect copy of a living person would not have the first person looking through two sets of eyes, and creating a perfect copy of a dead person would not bring the first person back to life.
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And this is simply not a problem under H because under H there's no magical, ineffable way of thinking about the self. You're still trying to think of the self under H as some sort of connection between two entities. That's just not at all what would follow from the self being an emergent property of the organism.
 
Jabba said:
Dave,
- This is where we keep tripping. My value for P(E|H) is based upon the naturalistic explanation, upon everything being physical, and also upon us not knowing E's causes. E is something we both experience, whether it is only physical or not...
- Currently, we're trying to figure out how we should determine E's likelihood, given H and ~H. What I'm trying to show now is that, since we don't think we can recreate the same E, we have to treat E's likelihood as totally random.
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If I understand, you're using "recreate" in the sense that even if we recreate the body and brain exactly we would have a duplicate "sense of self" and not the exact same "sense of self". Is that correct?

However, maybe that's wrong.

  1. Let's say we have the ability to take a "snapshot" of you at some point in time that can later be used to exactly recreate your body and brain.
  2. We do this just as you die.
  3. Later, when we have the knowledge to fix your cause of death, we recreate you and fix you.
  4. You are now alive again.

You will have complete continuity of memory, you will continue to feel exactly as you did about souls, baysian statistics, effective debate, rap music, etc. We will have recreated you, the same you, the same sense of self, the whole enchilada.
 
Jabba said:
Dave,
- My claim is that a perfect copy of me would be missing something -- my self awareness; whereas, a perfect copy of your wife's Beetle, would not be missing something (it would not be missing anything).
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His wife Beetle would have an identical (but not the same) smell, sound, wind resistance, ability to go 60 MPH, etc. These are all properties of the car, just as consciousness and a sense of self are properties of a working brain.
 
Jabba said:
Agatha,
- Good answer. That's my point.
- It seems to me that there would be something significantly different between the two copies of me...
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Not if they were, as Agatha said, identical. At least under H.

Your "something significantly different" is another blatant attempt to be beg the question by invoking the soul.
 
JimOfAllTrades said:
If I understand, you're using "recreate" in the sense that even if we recreate the body and brain exactly we would have a duplicate "sense of self" and not the exact same "sense of self". Is that correct?

However, maybe that's wrong.

  1. Let's say we have the ability to take a "snapshot" of you at some point in time that can later be used to exactly recreate your body and brain.
  2. We do this just as you die.
  3. Later, when we have the knowledge to fix your cause of death, we recreate you and fix you.
  4. You are now alive again.

You will have complete continuity of memory, you will continue to feel exactly as you did about souls, baysian statistics, effective debate, rap music, etc. We will have recreated you, the same you, the same sense of self, the whole enchilada.
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Yes, the only difference between the two would be their location in spacetime. I don't understand why others agree with Jabba that this would not be a recreation of the original, it fits every requirement to be described as such.
 
Jabba said:
Agatha,
- If we produced that perfect copy while I was still alive, would I find myself looking out two sets of eyes?
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Jabba said:
- I accept that creating a perfect copy of a living person would not have the first person looking through two sets of eyes, and creating a perfect copy of a dead person would not bring the first person back to life.
- Dinner time...
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That is some industrial grade dissonance. Don't you even know what your own claims are Jabba?
 
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